Into Thin Ice 105
explains Kim Holmén, the long-bearded inter-
national director of the Norwegian Polar Insti-
tute (NPI), which operates the Lance. Climate
models predict that by as early as 2040 it will be
possible in summer to sail across open water to
the North Pole.
Arctic sea ice helps cool the whole planet by
reflecting sunlight back into space. So its loss
inevitably will affect the climate and weather
beyond the Arctic, but precisely how remains
unclear. Better forecasts require better data
on sea ice and its shifting, uneven distribution.
“Most scientific cruises to the Arctic are con-
ducted in summer, and this is where we have the
most field data,” says Gunnar Spreen, an NPI
sea-ice physicist I met on board the Lance. “The
continuous changes that occur from winter into
spring are a huge gap in our understanding.”
On the Lance’s five-month mission its ro-
tating crew of international scientists would
investigate the causes and effects of ice loss by
monitoring the ice across its entire seasonal life
cycle—from the time when it formed in winter
until it melted in summer.
A few days after photographer Nick Cobbing
and I joined the ship by icebreaker and helicop-
ter from Longyearbyen, on the island of Spits-
bergen in the Svalbard archipelago—the base for
NPI’s Arctic operations—the Lance steamed to
83 degrees north, just west of Russian territory.
The scientists singled out a half-mile-wide floe
of predominantly seasonal ice that they hoped
to study. The crew tethered the vessel to the
floe with nylon ropes attached to thick metal
poles driven into the ice. They shut off the main
engine. Isolated and in near darkness, we began